How To: Mobile Gantry Crane Fabrication to Fill an Outdoors Lifting Gap

[Lionelgee]

Hello All,

I have not been an active contributor for a while so I thought I would post up some of my most recent activities. I found a gap in being able to lift things like engines out of vehicles while I am out in the paddock. I have a trailer with a crane mounted on it that does not have sufficient reach to lift engines out without extending the boom too much. The lifting capacity reduces the longer the boom. I can take things inside my shed where I have a mobile crane - a heavy duty engine hoist. However, this means towing vehicles from the paddock and then rolling them into the shed. I have strung a heavy duty chain in-between two shipping containers to lift loads of a trailer when I was out in the paddock. However, the chain left a lot to be desired. I realised that I still had a gap in my lifting capacity when I was was out in the paddock. Since then, I have been keeping watch for mobile gantry cranes and scoped out the new price for what seems like a pretty light weight set up.

I recently went on Facebook Marketplace and found a heavy duty mobile gantry crane on a farm. The only issue is that for it to be transported from the seller's farm to my place the braces between the A-frames that form the sides and the I-beam cross beam had to be cut. Even with the brace cut the A-frames still extended each side of the truck. Upon its arrival the I-beam hit the ground at an odd angle and one of the braces broke off. The most convenient place to drop the disassembled gantry crane was out in the paddock and the two A-frame legs were lent against a shipping container. The only issue with the 'convenient' location was that there is no electricity connected to the shipping container. With one brace leg broken off and the A-frame to I-beam cross member braces needing welding I needed to reposition everything closer to the shed where I have power connected.

I was going to use a chain block to lift the crossbeam to the top of the shipping container so I could reassemble the gantry crane. The pressing need to bring the parts so I had access to electricity meant that I needed to construct an alternative lifting frame so I could raise the I-beam high enough to attach the A-frame sides.

The I-beam was the first part moved to an already constructed heavy duty pallet racking frame. Some thick walled square hollow section steel allowed me to hook up a chain block. Only trouble was the sides of the pallet racking was not high enough to lift the I-beam up to the height of the A-frame. While I had gained 'proof of concept' and had raised the I-beam successfully, I had run out of lifting chain on the chain block. With this arrangement the I-beam could not be raised any higher.

Continued ...

Kind regards
Lionel